New Dimensions On The Axis

INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY
Posted 8/25/2006

Geopolitics: As the world dithers on Iran and North Korea, two new threats are surfacing on the U.S. intelligence radar that underscore why the West must get tougher on rogue states.

Venezuela and Cuba, which seemed to campaign for it, finally won spots in the Axis of Evil when the U.S. Director of National Intelligence set up a mission manager to coordinate strategy on the two countries.

Venezuela and Cuba weren't even on our intelligence radar until 2005 or 2006. Only the most recent National Security Strategy listed Venezuela as worth watching because "a demagogue awash in oil money is undermining democracy and seeking to destabilize the region."

The new office signals the trouble seems to be spreading.

Venezuela's only other appearance on a National Security Strategy was 1997, when it was praised for being America's No. 1 foreign oil producer, cutting our dependence on Mideast crude. Along with the re-emergence of Cuba, it's a strong change.

The new U.S. intelligence office will collect and analyze data, fill intelligence gaps and implement strategies. What stands out is that only North Korea and Iran have equivalent offices.

At this point, it's hard to believe the aging dictatorship in Havana or the anarchic regime in Caracas could pose a threat to the U.S. on the scale of Iran or North Korea. After all, they're not Islamofascists, but advocates of a discredited socialist ideology.

Only through bribing other nations into alliances, through oil or free doctors, can they win influence. When the cash runs out and the doctors defect, their leverage will be gone.

But their alliance with Iran complicates things. Consider:

• The State Department has declared Cuba a state sponsor of terror. The Castro regime has extensive ties to Hezbollah, the Iranian regime and the Colombian narcoguerrillas, providing training, finance and safe haven.

• Cuba's had considerable intersection with weapons of mass destruction. In 2002 testimony to the Senate, the State Department's assistant secretary for intelligence and research, Carl Ford, said: "Cuba has provided dual-use technology to rogue states. Such technology could support bioweapons programs in those states."

• Cuba's been sharing its electronic expertise with Iran for years, and has vast intelligence networks in the U.S., along with a claque of more overt leftist supporters, all of whom can be activated to Iran's propaganda advantage.

• Cuba has a history of attempting to pull a nuclear trigger at the U.S., as it nearly did in 1962. Although Fidel Castro is out of commission, Cuba remains under the same leadership.

Meanwhile:

• Venezuela has been declared a noncooperating state in the war on terror and since May has been subject to a U.S. arms embargo. The U.S.' report on terrorism said: "President Hugo Chavez has persisted in public criticism of U.S. counterterrorism efforts, publicly championed Iraqi terrorists, deepened Venezuelan collaboration with such state sponsors of terrorism as Cuba and Iran, and was unwilling to deny safe haven to members of Colombian terrorist groups, as called for in U.N. resolutions."

In House testimony, the State Department's deputy coordinator for counterterrorism, Frank Urbancic, called Chavez's noncooperation on terrorism "near complete."

• Chavez has made Iran his closest ally outside Cuba, visiting the ruling mullahs five times in seven years and introducing anti-Semitism into his diatribes. Trade between the regimes has expanded to more than $1 billion from virtually nothing a few years ago.

Chavez denies he has plans for bringing nuclear weapons to Venezuela, but growing two-way trade, with no obvious economic benefit, provides cover to ship more lethal commodities. Meanwhile, Chavez stresses that North Korea and Iran have the right to "peaceful atomic activities" as counterweights to U.S. "hegemony."

• Chavez is leading a worldwide diplomatic effort to win a nonpermanent seat on the United Nations Security Council, spreading cash and aid, something he vows to use to help Iran and thwart the U.S. on Iran's nuclear program. Along with outliers Cuba and Syria, Venezuela refused to refer Iran to the U.N. Security Council last February for sanctions.

• Chavez vows to cut off all oil exports to the U.S., 11% of our supply, if the West gets into a confrontation with Iran. "I stress herewith that, under whatever circumstances, we will always stand beside the Iranian nation," Chavez said from Tehran. " History has shown that as long as we stay united, we can remain resistant and defeat imperialism."

In short, Venezuela and Cuba are consolidating their common cause with Iran, significantly complicating the America's difficult bid to halt Iran's nuclear program.

Why is this happening? We think it's the hesitancy and inaction of the West to halt Iran's nuclear enrichment that's emboldening these non-Islamofascist, anti-American regimes.

Even without nukes, they amplify the militancy of the Iranians and North Koreans under the Third World rubric of "national self-determination." They also repeat the other rogue states' dissembling about their peaceful intentions and provide diplomatic cover for them at the U.N.

This growing alliance of anti-American enemies around Iran is a warning to us and our allies that either we take care of the problem in Iran now or our threats will multiply and grow closer.